Moving soon, best practices.

[_sludgefactory]

I'm moving soon, last time it was a disaster so I'm trying to plan ahead a little better. If you have moved your tank to a new home post up some tips.

This time I think I'm going to get a bunch of bags like they use at the LFS and pack all animals individually. Then float all the bags in a tub of tank water so they stay evenly temped and i that's kills two birds by bringing more water along.

Sand will all be replaced. I never use it after it gets all stirred up.

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[RichieT]

How far is the move?

 

[Duffam3434]

Yea the distance matters a bit. I moved my tank last year but we moved about 35 Miles so it was a pretty simple move. Its a major pain though bagging all those Coral!! That was time consuming!

 

[_sludgefactory]

I'm not moving very far. If I was I would just sell and buy new. I'm definitely bagging everything individually though. Lost a lot of things last time because they bumped in to each other.

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[Kworker]

Buckets with lids? Did you just try spacing everything out amongst buckets? rock in one bucket with no fish, just fish in another? Just drive careful and you should be good to go. I've never done it but I dont see why you just cant use a bunch of buckets and spread your stuff amongst it.

Best of luck with the move.

-KC

 

[JSB]

I have done it several time over the years and still have the original rubbermaid tubs I used the first time. I wrote it up and posted on a website I did years ago that is still there. The info may be dated and the site sorta broke, but here's how I do it: from Reef Sources

BTW: I mention coolers, but they are unnecessary in temperate weather. If you are in Ecuador or Alaska, they may have value, but a Sept day in PA should only require tubs.

 

[Mrfresh]

Hold long do u have until the move?
I did it with my 180 gallon tank before. I knew I was moving so I started pre work 2 months out...
Bc of a lot of sps fish and chalices I did the following...

I would turn off all my pumps inside the tank and return.
The first few times just for 10 mins.
Then I moved up to 30 mins. No water movement no new fresh water coming in...
Once I was to that point I started to do exposure.
I took my 25 gallon teach can u used for water mixing and would drain the tank some what into those.
This way the coral were out of the water.
At first only 10 to 15 mins. It was drain into one can go to the next. Once they were filled I turn on my sump pump and started putting water back into the sump.
I did that 2 times a week.
Then I waited longer to put the water back into the tank.
I got up to 1 hour of being out of water before filling the tank back up...
This was all done to get the corals used to rough conditions...
I did not leave my lights on tho. At the time I had MH and I felt that would dry them out being that close...


The move.
When I moved I had two days to do so.
The first day I went to the apt with trash cans and rubber maids and filled them up and started to mix salt with a heater also.
The rest of the day we moved all of our stuff over.
Day 2.
Shut down the tank baged everything up deove it over.
Dropped them into the holding and got some water movement and carbon in the water.
Tore down the tank cleaned the sand moved it and re set it up.
Filled it will all new fresh mixed water and gave it a week...
I had a mini cycle but large water changes daily helped along with a lot of cured live rock.
And tossed everything back in.

Now if u go bare bottom when u move I would think u can move everything back into the tank same day.

Good luck.


Take everything I said with a grain of salt.
I did what I did bc I'm crazy.

 

[Dixie_reefer]

I recently did a 1300 mile move and the only thing i lost was a shrimp and a crab. I used 5 gallon buckets and made a multi level frag rack with egg crate, 1/4" pipe, and zip ties. I put battery operated air stones in each bucket. It was a 2 day drive plus a few extra days in buckets while we looked for a house. I used a 50/50 ratio of old and new water in each bucket.

 

[Mrfresh]

Wow that's pretty crazy, good to know someone can do it that far.

 

[Reefs-A-Lot]

i did the same as dixie reefer, but i used 3 27 gallon rubbermaid roughneck tubs(homedepot black and yellow tubs) zip tied them shut, my move was only 16 miles, but all was good didnt loose one thing.

just take your time.

 

[_sludgefactory]

I should have plenty of time to move. I'm paying someone to move my actual stuff. I'm probably also going to hire a pro from my LFS to help me, he does tank maintenance and actually knows his stuff. I figure that's better then getting a friend who know nothing about it to help and money isn't an object. I'm definitely bagging all the corals individually, fish can go in a bucket. Rock into a garbage can with wet newspaper and I'm going to save pretty much all the water and reuse it. All except the nasty water the gets to much detritus in it from the sand. I can even buy the new sand and have it prerinsed at the new place so its ready to go. I'm thinking about building some kind of sweet new rock work too like someone just put up from their 180 build. Its not going to happen for at least several months so I have plenty of time to plan.

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